improvised teleprompter for GH2

I just had a strange idea and ...improvised myself a teleprompter for video podcasting.
There are scores of teleprompter-apps out there for Android but it's hard to get a beamsplitter in any size like 300x400mm without shelling out >100 Euro.
("Free Teleprompter" doesn't change the font-size on IceCreamSandwich and is thus unusable. Sorry.)

What I did was to use my Nexus Galaxy in it's Otterbox outdoor case.
The case has an extremely sturdy belt clip that can even rotate the phone.
So I combined a short strip of wood that has the exact maximum width of the belt, the belt clip and securely hook on to.
This way the belt clip securely gribs all around the wood and cannot move.
Then I drilled a 1/4 inch hole and positioned this piece of wood using a magic arm (chinese clone)  attached to the hot shoe of the camera.

Result: It works very very well and takes up virtually no space at all.
With the PanLeica 25mm lens (slightly less then 50mm without crop) the eye movement and direction of viewing works well when the shot covers head and upper body.
With a closeup covering only the head you notice that I am actually looking towards a point above the lens.
You'd need a longer lens (like 50mm or 85mm) and position the camera further away to do this.
...or an actual beamsplitter mirror to have the text in front of the lens.

• Photos
• Teleprompter apps

CCC Freiburg

CCC meeting was great.
Had to pick up the workshop tools they borrowed from me to create a lockable wall to lock away expensive equipment.

The Hackerspace is half way done and there are enough people interested in getting our radio show going again.
I do have all the technology but work demands that I leave Freiburg for about two years.
So I can't help much except in doing interviews on CCC events.
All that talking about the podcasts makes me want to do another show on my sleeping YouTube channel myself....
I'm unsure about standing on front of a camera again because of my imperfect English...

My GSoC student made it

Looks like my Google Summer of Code student made it.
He'll have two mentors including me and I hope this works out well.
Haven't done this before.

• Vespucci Open Street Map editor (I'm that lazy bastard of a maintainer after the last maintainer gave up due to time constraints.)
• my short announcement on the mailing list

PCB holder for Prusa 3d printer

 Looks like a user called "Atntias" found the PCB holder platform I designed for the ThingOMatic usefull enough to design a similar platform for the Prusa Mendels.

• Design files on Thingiverse 

iOS translations

I'm currently playing around with iOS software development.
Having done Java half of my life and Android for the last 2+ years it sounded like a sensible thing to look at...
The thing I'm currently looking at is localisation.
I'm quite underwelmed.

It really looks like the current way to design UIs are storyboard files.
They are a newly introduced mechanism. So I can expect Apple to have learned from any past mistakes.
They are graphically edited XML files that contain the UI elements, their connection to the Code and all strings.
...They don't support any localisation.
From what I figured out the way to translate them it so basically let XCode (the IDE) create a full copy of that file and you replace all texts in there.
This means that any added, moved or otherwise modified UI-element needs to be done again and again for every language your project features.
Dumb!
Just plain dumb!
No one but an american could have come up with such nonsense in localisation.

Show Firefox Passwords for Android updated

On the Chaos Computer Club meeting today I updated the free version of ShowFirefoxPasswords.
It now has a menu to allow filtering the lists on devices that have no menu-button anymore.
(Formerly you long-pressed the menu button to filter lists that implement the Filterable interface.)
I also added support for GoogleTV. It should appear in the market on the TV any time now.
(No sideload nonsense.) 

• ShowFirefoxPasswords(lite) on Android Market

YN460 II flash on external power

As planned I converted 2 Yongnuo YN460 II to external power.
The plug on the first one is a bit shaky because I had to resolder it multiple times until I found that there was a hidden second ground cable from the battery-contacts to the flash head.
So I was wondering why it would charge and everything but not flash when switching from the battery contacts to external power and thus accidentally having the flash head itself float without ground.

I'm using a 6V 2.25mAh wall wart style universal power supply with overload protection.
Others have used 1.4A and 2.8A and it seems that you can go way higher then 2.8A to get even faster recycle times.
I am not sure I want to go there as I find this more then fast enough and don't want to overheat my flash head.

• Photos

Lee filters on a flash variation

Using the sample catalog of Lee Filters to change the color of your hotshoe camera flash is pretty much standard.
I changed that theme a bit by using a stapler.
I took off the filtes I wanted to use most often and their description sheet.
Then I turned around the filter (because the puch holes are not perfectly centered) and stapled on the description to the filter, so it would be visible.
This way it's easy to identify a specific filter even though many of the colors look alike when you don't have a direct comparison.

YN460 II on external power

I couldn't sleep, so I took a PH00 screwdriver and  started experimenting if an YN460 II flash can be powered by 230V mains.
A 2.2A 6V wall wart seems to work just fine.
I guess I'll get another such wall wart, some power-sockets and switches to switch between external power and battery on monday, then modify both my flashes.
There also seems to be enough space in there to integrate my 4 channel RF remote triggers directly into the body of these.

• Photos (coming soon)
• Video (coming soon)
• All Videos (please subscribe)

Playing with DIY light modifiers

I thought about buying some light modifiers to play around with.
...then it occured to me that I do have a workshop downstairs.
So I started building some 2cm and 5cm grid lights for my 2 YN460-II slave flashes.
(Need to do the same for my Metz 58 AF-2 since it's bigger and they don't fit on both kinds of flashes.) 

• Howto
• Beauty Dish 

unmodified YN460-II at 1/128

with 2cm grid added

with 5cm grid added

Me as a Google Summer of Code mentor for Android OSM apps

After Graham Jones asked me,
I volunteered to be a mentor for one a possible student working on Android apps for OpenStreetMap.
There seems to be a proposal to create something more geared towards inexperienced mappers based on the Vespucci code of which I took over for the retired maintainer years ago.


"Hi,

Your request to become a Mentor for has been accepted.

Greetings,
The Google Open Source Programs Team" 

• Vescpucci OpenStreetMap geo- editor for Android 
• OpenStreetMap
• Google Summer of Code (German)

ported aLogcat to GoogleTV and Android 4

I just commited the required changes to make the popular development tool "aLogcat" work well on GoogleTV and apear for such devices in Android Market and to make good use of the ActionBar on Android 3.x and Android 4.x.
I guess the next release will feature these changes.

• aLogCat in Android Market

EasterHegg Basel 2012 - Decoded the Zoom H4n remote control protocol!!!

(Update: I'm doing the same for the new Zoom H5 too.)

For the next 4 days I am on EasterHegg and reverse engeneering the protocol spoken between the RC04 remote and the Zoom H4n audio recorder.
This posting is constantly being updated and rewritten with details as they come up.
Newsticker:

• Friday
• So far no luck with the OpenBench logic sniffer. 
• Can't figure out if the buffered inputs support 3.3V signals or only 5V signals. We are trying to verify this by connecting and disconnecting the on-board 3.3V supply to an input-pin to get a known signal.
• But we are out of chocolate and coffee!!!
• Saturday
• I fetched my pocket-oscilloscope from home but forgot 2 cables.
• Contacted "Nussgipfel" for an oscilloscope because he holds an oscilloscope-workshop tonight. So he must have a working device. Hope to verify that the signal is 3.3V and count it's frequency/bitrate to get the OpenBench to work on decoding it. 
• Hacked my pocket-Oscilloscope. Found a 5V signal (-0.5 to 4.5V and -1 to 4V) in the 600-800Hz range.

  Aus 2012-04-07_EasterHegg

• Decoded the signal

  Aus 2012-04-07_EasterHegg

• Batteries died while decoding the LED signals. Buttons are decoded.
• Sunday
• Trying to find Nussgipfel again to make screenshots of the undistorted waveforms and document my findings below.
• Found a second signal being transmitted with >100ms delay after the first signal. Need help analysing it.

  Aus 2012-04-07_EasterHegg

• checked the signal using a larger scope. Seems I had GND and Signal confused on the small one. Low<->High. May be RS232 after all? With start+stop -bit the signal checks out. 2.400 = 417 µs per bit seems to match our 0,4ms per bit.
• Making a break to eat some fondue down in the huuuuuuge bunker below this building. Planning to use a larger logic analyser later.
• ...
• Monday
• ...

---

Aus 2012-01-22_RC04

Observations:

The 4 connections between RC04 remote and H4n are labeled 3.3V, RX, TX and GND.

The single chip on the remote is labeled "D78f0500A"
It could be an NEC microcontroller µPD78f0500.
The number of pins and the pins connected to RX, TX and SCK seem to match.
The datasheet is in Korean but what I can make out is that this should be a 5MHz microcontroller that can run on 3.3V and 5V. No details from the datasheet cast and light on the strange encoding used(described below).

What I found out about the protocol being transmitted by the RC04 remote on the 2 lines "RX" and "TX" when certain buttons are pressed on the remote or the Zoom H4n lights up certain LEDs is as follows:

Findings:


 The protocoll is RS232 at 3.3V with 2400bps 8n1
The remote sends 2 sequences of 2 bytes with a small delay:
Record: 0x81 0x00 | 0x80 0x00
Play:   0x82 0x00 | 0x80 0x00
Stop:   0x84 0x00 | 0x80 0x00
ffwd:   0x88 0x00 | 0x80 0x00
rwd:    0x90 0x00 | 0x80 0x00
vol+:   0x80 0x08 | 0x80 0x00
vol-:   0x80 0x10 | 0x80 0x00
rec+:   0x80 0x20 | 0x80 0x00
rec-:   0x80 0x40 | 0x80 0x00
mic :   0x80 0x01 | 0x80 0x00
ch1 :   0x80 0x02 | 0x80 0x00
ch2 :   0x80 0x04 | 0x80 0x00

It receives a single byte that is a bitmask of the LEDs to light up:



? && 0x01 = record LED
? && 0x10 = MIC LED
? && 0x60 == CH1+CH2 LED = 0x20 + 0x40
? && 0x20 = CH1 green
? && 0x40 = CH2 green
? && 0x04 = CH1 red 0x16?
? && 0x08 = CH2 red


? && 0x24 = CH1 yellow (red+green)
? && 0x48 = CH2 yellow (red+green)




Links

• Easterhegg
• OpenBench
• DS0201  "DSO Nano" pocket oscilloscope (manual)
• µPD78f0500
• Photos (Sorry, rejected photos where uploaded too for some reason)
• Photos of the RC04 for the H4n
• All Videos (please subscribe)
• Andreas made a radio remote for the Zoom H4n based on these findings.

Next step: implement this in an ATTiny13 using a softUart. Maybe use a CMOS 4019 /
4052 or MAX4619 to trigger something else too.

OpenBench

I'm currently checking out the OpenBench logic sniffer.
What I plan to do is to play with one on EasterHegg in Basel this weekend and reverse engeneer the serial protocoll used by the RC04 remote control of the Zoom H4n audio recorder.
With that information I should be able to program a Microcontroller to start not only 1-3 cameras but also the sound recording in perfect sync with one button on the right handle of my camera rig.
(2 cameras for 3D, 3 cameras for interviews, usually only 1 camera+1x4 channels of sound)

• OpenBench
• EasterHegg (CCC event. This time in Basel, Switzerland) 

CCC Hackerspace Freiburg

I was away for15 month due to an Android project that got extended again and again.
During this time the Chaos Computer Club Freiburg (of which I am a founding member) managed to create it's own Hackerspace.
Now for the first time I get to see it...
It is located in a former subterran walkway that has been extended and fittet with ventilation, power, internet, security system,...

Developing for Samsung SmartTV

After a glimpse of how to develop for GoogleTV,
I'm now downloading the Samsung SmartTV SDK 3.1.1.

Download 
Let's see how difficult it is to develop apps for my own TV set and get them into Samsung's market.
The nearly 300MB are still downloading...done.

Well...it's a 300MB ZIP-file containing.... an exe file.
Nowhere did it state that Windows was required.
On the contrary. "Specs &Features" says "Linux 2.6".
Looks like apps for a Samsung TV are not actually apps but downloaded websites with Javascript and optinal flash content that can make use of special API calls.

Installer
Quote of the day:
"If you want to make sync between TV and SDK, check and install apache server"
Not only does it install a full blown Apache server.
It does not let you choose to install only SmartTV 2011 and not 2010 and 2012.
It clutters the desktop with  4 new icons. One for each emulator and one for an "Apps Editor" that ...requires administrator priviliges.

 App Editor
The dialog says: "Manufacturer: Unknown" but I have to give it admin permissions.
Next dialog: Windows firewall complains about it.
The screen resembles XCode pretty much.
No example projects to open. ...this could make it hard to get a grip on how things should work.
I can create 3 trypes of project: Basic, Javascript and Flash.
In the next step it asks me a number of settings without any help as to their meaning and useless names like "cpname", "cplogo", "mgrver" or "dcont"="y".
The language is definately Javascript.  I'm not terribly exited about that given the state of javascript development and debuging tools I've seen so far. Or better the absense of them.
There is a UI designer and it does reflect simple changes of the code in the UI.
I can create buttons and other UI elements. What I can't do it double-click or right-click on a button to get to the code that handles the click.
I can run it in an emulator and debug in an emulator.
No setting to run this on my Samsung TV.

Emulator
Also triggers a Windows Firewall warning....twice.
I wonder why I did not get a choice as to what emulator to run. It just opens the 2012 one even if I want to test on a 2011 TV set.
There is a menu "Run Active Project...". Apart from the wrong capitalisation the elipsis ("...") should indicate that a dialog will open. ...doesn't happen. Just the 212 emulator again.

 Uploading
The documentation tells me how to package my app. Aparently separate packages need to be created for Europe, America, Asia, Africa and "Others".
It does not tell me how to instal and run that package on my TV.
However I did find a blog posting about it: here
Problem is: That seems to be for 2010 TV sets. My 2011 TV does have a completely different menu and no "server" or "development" setting in there.
Found it!
You need to loose all stored passwords on your TV (not again...50+ character passwords are a PAIN to type on a TV remote). Instructions are here.
Looks like you have to create a new account with the special name "develop" that no one cared to tell you about. Then a special menu will suddenly apear.
In the menu you can set your development PC as the server. You have to enter an IPv4. There is no space if your network uses IPv6 .

• download the SDK 
• Running your app on an actual TV set
• Running on a 2011 TV set
• Stackoverflow postings 

My first GoogleTV app

I just updated my dropbox account type and my dropbox file manager app to run on GoogleTV too.
It works really well to navigate through the local file system and multiple Dropbox accounts using the large GoogleTV remote.
The password is only entered once per account and the large screen can support the existing tablet-UI showing local and remote side at the same time.

• App in Android Market

3D photos in Photoshop CS6 BETA

I played around with 3D photos lately.
What I found missing was a program to do basic editing of 3D photos.
I need:

• white balance
• saturation, levels, brightness, contrast,...
• crop, scale and rotate to make some horizontal/vertical line in the photo truely horizontal/vertical
• save in the original MPO-format as well as SideBySide+Red/Cyan-Anaglyph.

Extremely basic operations.

After someone commented that Photoshop CS6 spports MPO files (containers with 2 JPEG-images used for 3D photos), I check it out.

Bridge CS6 doesn't offer "Photoshop" or "Camera Raw" as "open with...".
Bummer. I can only open it with the Preview -app of MacOS from within Bridge.

Then I opened the MPO -files in the Photoshop CS6 trial.
They open in a "3D-layer" where I can switch between Anaglyph and SideBySide.
However apart form HDR-toning I can't do anything.
No brightness/contrast,
no levels,
nothing involving colors at all.
I am offered to crop+turn the image but for turning a) I need to input the rotation in degrees instead of marking a horizontal/vertical line b) it asks me to convert from 3D into a SmartObject. I can't convert back to 3D.
Trimming a 3D image displayed as side-by-side trims the SBS-image, not the left+the right image, so it destroys the image.

So yes, it can open them but I can't DO anything with it once I opened it.

First experiences with GoogleTV

I just got a free GoogleTV from Google as part of a congress and wand to write my experiences as I give it a test...
The device is a Logitech Revue.

The plastic feels cheap and the first thing I noticed was that I got shipped a unit  with a US power plug (This is Germany and it was a German conference and we are just a few month away from the all-Europe launch of GoogleTV).
The power supply however is 100-240V and I found a compatible cable around the house.

Switching it on I noticed it having HDMI in and out.  However there is no connector for my satelite dish. I wonder how I'm supposed to watch TV with it. For the time being the TV signal stays connected to by buggy Samsung SmartTV.

Next issue: I removed the strip and powered on the remote keyboard. The box says it cannot find it's remote and that I am supposed to switch it on. What it does not say is that the remote is only ever detected if I press a button on it too. (Took a while of waiting to find that out by accident.)

Next step: This is the first HDMI device ever that wants me to define the edges of the screen in a manual 4 step process. I though HDMI was digital and never needed this crap.

Nest stop: Internet. It can do Ethernet and Wifi. Wifi however apparently only in 2.4GHz and not in the less crowded 5GHz band. I hope it's at least 802.11n and not 11g.
Entering the password is very easy with the keyboard but it feels super cheap. Quite a turndown from a company that has a name of building good keyboards.
BTW, as I guessed after that US power plug...the keyboard has a US layout. At least, being a developer, I'm used to use this layout every once in a while.
All the UI up to this point is also in english and there is no language selection before the setup.

Next step: Installing updates. Quite fast. No surprises. Reboots multiple times but at least it shows progress bars that actually move.
For a few seconds I noticed that the device actually has a fan and that it can be very loud. But only for a few seconds.

Looks like after the updates I have to do all the setup steps again. Screen size, looking up and typing the Wifi password,... I suddenly however see new options like selecting to not use DHCP in Wifi.

Then it's entering my Google account password.
It can backup and restore my data to that account and automatically installed at least the OIFileManager. I'll have to check what other apps from my Android cellphone and tablet have found their way onto the GoogleTV.

After accepting the EULA, be careful not to accidentaly check [X] Send me SPAM about logitech products.

Then it wants my ZIP-code...but not the country. It thinks the German ZIP-code of 79110 is in Amarillo, Texas. I guess I won't get any "accurate programming information".

Next step: TV...this is going to get interesting.
It asks me if I have a set-top box.  No, I haven't.  Like every TV I know the Samsung SmartTV has the tuner build-in and connects to dish, cable and/or terrestrial TV itself. Else it would not BE a TV but just a dumb monitor.

Remote..it wants to know my TV brand and model. It does know the Samsung UE40D8090  and it looks like my GoogleTV-remote can be a remote for my TV.
Given the rather advanced functionality of the TV I guess I'll continue to use my Android-phone and the original remote for that job.
It asks me what input-port my GoogleTV is on my TV. I guess that's needed for the remote-control part.
Setup tells me that I can: Turn the TV on/off, Switch input to Google-TV and control the volume. ...I expected a BIT more but In guess that's enough to grab just that one remote and the one from the stereo to use GoogleTV instead of jougling 3 remote controls.
Later I found out that pressing "TV" on the remote does not switch the input channel of the TV back from the GoogleTV -input to live-TV but instead turns off the TV set.

Now it asks me for my VCR. I can't select the already chosen Samsung SmartTV that has a build in VCR (like more modern TV-sets nowadays).

The following advertisement video is not 16:9 and does not use the full screen. It has black borders on all 4 edges. Why did I have to set this up again?

Then it's automatically shutting down.  WTF?

Oh, BTW: it's 60HZ.  I fear that I'll get artifacts watching normal, european 50HZ and 25Hz footage due to the 3:2 pulldown to get them to americal 60Hz. At least the TV-set does support both natively.

Done...let's see what apps we have..
My expectation is to find either very few apps at all or many apps that don't work outside the US.
First thing: YouTube. The obvious choice.
I can select it, then click "My YouTube" to see my own channel's videos....however it is sitting at "signing in" for minutes now and nothing happens.
Oh...that is not a notifcation that it is currently signing in, that's a button!!!
(Why does it say "signing in" and not "press to sign in" then?)  I can select an account.
Great!! I didn't hope for multi-account capabilities. I guess families or >1 did complain. ;)

Next app: "live TV".  It tells me that I have no set-top box but allows to choose "generic video source" instead. Well..this is rediculus. I guess it only ever supports video via HDMI-in. Didn't the website say it supports satelite TV? Whatever should I do with a GoogleTV that does not support TV?

Next: "Music"  ..."Please go to http://music.google.com/ on your PC to sync your music library".
Hello? Didn't you hear that Google Music it not avaliable in Germany yet? In fact it's not avaliable anywhere except the US and canada!
Aparently I cannot add music to my device except by using a service that is not even announced to become avaliable some day anywhere on my continent.

"TV&Movies" ...a unified selection of live TV and all video rental services it has (YouTube, Amazon, ...).
I only see strange US shows that I have never even heard of.

"Netflix" Are you a Netflix member? no=>Sorry, Netflix is not available in your country.
That's one of the features top entries at the buttom of the screen. Right below a black area that is supposedly intended to show live TV. Except this box doesn't have an input for live TV.

"Market" OMG. I have never seen Android Market so empty! The only app that is not preinstalled anyway in "My Apps" is OI File Manager. Not even my K-9 mail is there.
But it does display "NBA Game Time for Google TV" wich is certainly not any of "My Apps".
WTF is the NBA anyway? Some sport stuff?
There is no Gmail here! No Google Calendar! Not even Picasa!
My regular TV has access to more Google services that this GoogleTV!!!
Searching for "mail" is supposed to show screens after screens of apps...there is not a single email app in GoogleTV.
The one video rental service I actually have an account with "maxdome"(never actually rented something) ...has no GoogleTV app.
The store is so small, it has but a front-page and 2 categories: "other apps" and "other games".
I cannot uninstall CNBC, Napster, NBA or Netflix even though they don't even work on this continent.

"Podcats" I'm surprised to find such an app. First thing: It is empty. I would have expected my podcasts from Google Reader in here. Searching for some of the top 10 German podcasts shows...no results. (Chaosradio, Lautsprecher, CRE)
I can't find an option to add a podcast by URL.

"Photos": It supports Picasa and Flickr accounts.  Looks like even more then one Google account is supported at a time. It is quite slow but at least it's finally an app to watch 3D photos from 2 Google Accounts in full screen and full resolution on my TV. (Samsung has issues with sometimes only getting 240x??? images and supports only 1 account.)

"Pandora" Nice startup-logo but nothing happens. No reaction, no menu, nothing at all.

Preliminary result: In it's current state it's useless. Both in hardware (no TV) and software (basic Google apps missing, let alone 3rd party apps).

"options": For some reason I can select "Allow mock location" in developer options. I can't imagine any more stationary device then a TV set.
"Chrome to TV". Aparently I can push links from a Crome browser to the TV. Problem is: I don't use Chrome. I'm using Firefox and DolphinHD because they sync passwords among each other.

"Storage": 520MB free internal storage and I an enable external FTP access.
1: FTP is insecure and I won't allow it on MY network. sftp is a minimum.
2: What to use FTP storage for if this device has no TV to record.
It seems this GoogleTV does not know about DLNA servers on my network. So my regular TV can watch videos, music, ... from my file server but my GoogleTV can not.

"Time and Location":  "Network provided time" puts me on GMT-5. I am however in GMT+2 here.
I cannot choose an ISO date format 2012-03-30 nor the national 30.03.2012 . Only permutations of this strange XX/YY/ZZZZ US-format.


Last quest: How to turn this thing off?

New field monitor for focus

about this blog
I haven't written here in a while.
It has been way too tempting to post 1-2 lines on Google+ instead and be done with it.
I think in a world of Twitter and G+, blogs should be about "quality content" in the sense that an entry has more then a paragraph and a single photo or link.

what recently happened
So, what have I been up to in the last days?
After having constructed and 3d-printed so much film and photo equipment last year,
I'm trying to learn how to use it properly. ;)
Working my way through books about setting up light, image composition, exposing for film, cutting video for different results,...
Experimenting with Strobist like still photography and getting experienced with pulling manual focus on a moving camera.
There lies the problem. My best lenses are the Leica/Panasonic 25mm f1.4 and the incredible Voightländer 25mm f0.95 .
These two babies can have a very shallow field of depth if you want it.
That looks great for portraits or close-ups but is impossible to focus in video on the camera display alone.


topic: field monitors for DSLRs
I have been and am still looking for an affordable field monitor that can help with this issue.
What am I'm looking for?

• At least 800x480 if not 720p. 

I tried that resolution in a shop and it allows me to see differences in focus clearly that are unnoticeable on the camera display.

• At least peaking (superimposed edge-detection, highlighting the object in focus)

Here is what I found so far:

SmallHD DP6 (too expensive)
Great! Just perfect.
Does everything you want and does it great.
The problem: The 1000eur price tag.
I would consider it very, very carefully if...it where not clear that in a few years we'll get such a monitor in FullHD. Maybe even 3D autostereoscopic.
(Looks like Lilliput has something like that)

Marshall V-LCD50 (still too expensive)
Still very expensive at 650eur.
It does  peaking AND false colors for focus.

Sony-CLM-V55 (nearly there)
300eur.
does peaking and 1:1 (zoom in to show 1 camera pixel as 1 display pixel)

Lilliput 667GL (too cheap)
This is too cheap.
170 eur is okay but there is no focus assist at all.

Calumet branded one (forget it)
Forget about this one.
380eur and no focus helping at all.
Saturation is too low even at maximum.

F&V F1 (cheap!!!)
200eur with peaking.
800x480.
Sounds great!
I would get this one if I did not find....

• Review

Lilliput 5D-II/O/P (YES!!!)
360eur (320eur including customs and 19% import sales tax)
this sounds like the PERFECT one!
The old "/o" had nothing but the newer "/o/p" model looks great.
1024x600 (600p) ...strange resolution but better then 480p.
HDMI in + out ...well...I have no use for the out part but it could be nice.
The real deal is:

• Peaking (highlighting the object in focus)
• Zebra (pattern in overexposed areas)
• False Color (coloring over+underexposed areas)
• Zoom (1x to 8x including 1:1)
• Image Freeze,...
• Specification
• Review

THAT'S the one I want to try. Then I'll update this blog posting with the result...